


A Time of Beauty

by AkashaTheKitty



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Community: dhr_advent, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-04 06:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5323952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AkashaTheKitty/pseuds/AkashaTheKitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione Granger decides that Draco Malfoy needs a makeover for the Christmas gala.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Time of Beauty

The soft, subtle notes of a Christmas carol playing in the background, was being viciously punctuated by some of the foulest swear words Hermione had heard in a while. In the spirit of the season, she attempted to ignore it and instead immerse herself in the cosy feeling of sitting in her warm office doing what she loved best, with the darkness and the calm falling over the land.

A particularly nasty outburst yanked her back to reality, and she had to resign herself to interacting with the fount of holiday cheer that was currently decorating her office under severe protest.

“Do you really have to be so noisy, Malfoy?” she asked. “I swear, if you just did as asked instead of making it into some big production, you could have been done three times over by now.”

He sneered back at her, and she swore there was even a hint of teeth. “This ridiculousness is not part of my job description!”

“It was, actually. You were told to look to me for instructions.”

“Not for instructions on how to make my fingers bleed with tinsel!”

“Oh, please. If you hadn't attempted to use your wand at first, you wouldn't have got the tinsel so knotted up in the first place. Besides,your fingers don't bleed.”

He held up his hand to show the open cut on his index finger.

“Oh!” Hermione immediately got to her feet. “How on earth did you manage that? Let me have a look!”

She hurried towards him but he took a step back and held his hand away from her. “No! Just stop tormenting me with this glittering death trap.”

“No exaggeration, of course.”

“Don't think I'm not on to you. This is your version of death by a thousand cuts, isn't it? Only with the added humiliation of my end being administered by Father Christmas or some innocent-looking angel. Angels are the worst. They're little devils in disguise.”

“Uh-huh, you've seen through my master plan.”

“Yes, the holly should've been a clue. All that damned stabbing only served to soften my flesh. Like an unholy Christmas tenderiser.”

Hermione battled to keep a straight face. Amusing as his sarcasm often was, Malfoy rarely appreciated it when she openly laughed at his annoyance. “Am I to assume that you don't like my ornaments?”

“Yes, that would be a rather safe assumption on your part. What's the meaning with it, anyway? This is a place of business. Nobody will take us seriously with all that... junk everywhere.”

And he meant it too. Hermione took him in with a look. Pale short hair, pale skin, pale eyes, all completely drowned out by the severe black of his stiff and formal robes. As Harry tended to say, _Watch out, here comes the Vicar Malfoy._ No offence to any vicars, but Harry sort of had a point.

“It may come as a surprise to you, Malfoy,” she said, “but some people actually find reassurance in the fact that the people who work for them at the Ministry are also human, and will take you _more_ seriously because of it.”

“Hm. And that is why I will be _your_ boss soon.” He smiled. It was without mirth or triumph, but held a sort of sinister promise. He was probably thinking of ways to torture her with tinsel.

“Yes. Well.” Hermione narrowed her eyes, feeling an idea slowly taking form. It was an interesting feeling. Usually inspiration struck her fast and true, but this idea was a little more hesitant to take shape. “Speaking of advancement, what you will wear to the Christmas gala tonight?”

“The same I always wear, of course. Black dress robes.”

“Right.” Hermione glanced at the clock. “It's been a slow day, we can go early.”

The look of relief on his face was striking. “No more decorating?”

This time it was Hermione's turn to smile with a sinister promise. “Oh, I don't know about that...”

***

“You must be joking!”

“Stop frowning, Malfoy. You'll get wrinkles.”

“This is most definitely outside what you, as my employer, can demand of me,” he whinged.

“I don't know. I hear that Mr Bunyan over at Department of International Magical Cooperation demanded that his female employees wear make up.”

“Well, naturally they should look their best representing the Ministry!”

“Oh? Then why are no male employees required to wear make up?”

“Don't be ridiculous.”

“I'm not. You are, with your double standards.”

“You honestly think men should wear make up?”

“No, I think you should stand still while we try to make you look your best for when you represent the Ministry tonight.”

Hermione bravely battled the smug expression that kept wanting to steal over her features, as she watched Malfoy's face go from stunned to resigned. The seamstress she'd managed to book for an emergency fitting, chuckled.

“She got you there, _chéri_ ,” Madam Bouchard said with a flirting lilt to her voice. Hermione had to hide a smile at the look of dismay Malfoy shot Bouchard, who was notorious for milking the French seamstress angle for all it was worth.

“What's wrong with Madam Malkin?” he asked. “No offence to this... ah... Madam Bouchard here, but Madam Malkin has been making my robes since I could walk.”

“Maybe that's the problem,” Hermione muttered, but when Malfoy shot her a sharp look, she said, “Madam Bouchard is the best there is, just leave yourself in her capable hands and you'll see that she can work miracles.”

Malfoy shot Madam Bouchard another dark look. “Fine. But if those capable hands don't stop measuring my buttocks, I'm leaving.”

Hermione gaped. “Madam Bouchard! You're a married woman!”

Madam Bouchard only grinned and shrugged. “My husband is away. Can't blame a lonely woman for testing goods this surprisingly good.”

Malfoy raised an eyebrow at that and Hermione felt her cheeks heat at the sheer inappropriateness. “If you could please refrain from testing Mr Malfoy's goods, I would appreciate it.”

“No problem, love. Mr Malfoy, I will have to ask you to remove your clothes.”

Malfoy's eyes bulged and Hermione felt herself sputtering a bit before she finally choked out, “Will that really be necessary?”

Madam Bouchard shot her a sardonic look. “I may appreciate the male form a little more than you English would prefer, but the fact that his buttocks surprised me means that his current robes obscure too much for me to make a good fit. I take pride in my trade, Miss Granger, and I make a good fit or I make no fit.”

Hermione didn't really know what to say to that. She just bit her lip and shot Malfoy a questioning look. He glared at her and she couldn’t help but squirm with what definitely had to be guilt and not excitement. Certainly not that. Then he sighed and began untying his belt. “Just be done with it, woman.”

If Madam Bouchard was at all affected by his bad mood, she didn't show it. “If that is what you say in the bedroom, _cherí_ , I believe I know why your mood is so foul.”

Malfoy only growled in response, and Hermione decided it was safest to turn her back and inspect the parts of the shop that did not include a grouchy, half-naked Malfoy. Even if part of her was scouting around for mirrors.

***

For the tenth time that night, Hermione glanced nervously at her watch. Malfoy was late. It had taken longer than anticipated to get the robes fitted and she'd had to leave him with the hairdresser and trust that he'd get his hair lengthened and styled in spite of his protests, and that he'd then go back for the finished robes to get dressed on his own.

She could hardly have attended this function in her own work clothes, so she'd told him to meet her here at the party so they could present a united front. In retrospect, she'd probably expected a bit much from someone as recalcitrant as him

“I will enjoy making you pay for this, Granger, I swear.”

A rush of relief swept through Hermione and she turned around with a glib reply on her tongue that died the second she saw him. Malfoy was scowling as usual, but other than that, nothing else looked the same. The ice blue silk hugging his frame in all the right places combined with his natural paleness still made him seem coolly detached from mere mortals, like a sculpture carved from ice come to life, but the way his hair had been lengthened and manipulated now gave him a playful, boyish look. A lock of this hair kept falling into his eye to his obvious annoyance, but not even his mood could ruin the effect.

“Yes, I know I look ridiculous. Can you stop staring now?” he snapped.

Hermione blinked. Ridiculous wasn't the word she'd have used, unless it was in the sense of ‘ridiculously fit’. She managed to look up into his eyes, those eyes that burned and suddenly made her feel flushed. Oh, Merlin. This wouldn't do. “Did you... have anything else done? Say, enhancing spells of any sort?” She grabbed a glass of nice, cool white wine off a passing tray and tried to douse the heat.

“You mean to ask if I went out of my way to have even more absurd things done to me?”

“No... no, of course not.” She couldn't help but bite her lip as she tried very hard not to continue ogling him.

He shot her an odd look. “What's wrong with you tonight, Granger?”

“Here, let's make our rounds.” She grabbed onto his forearm, which was a mistake. It was firm and... She immediately let go. “Well, come on, then!” she ordered and went ahead.

He shook his head and followed.

***

“Who's this, then?” crooned Mrs Clutterbuck.

“Malfoy. Still Malfoy,” muttered Hermione, drinking deeply from her third glass of wine. She’d got her reaction somewhat under control, but now she had to battle her annoyance with the witches flocking to the new and improved Malfoy.

Malfoy shot her another one of those odd looks and then greeted the influential witch properly with a charm that Hermione honestly hadn’t even known he possessed, before not-so-gently grabbing Hermione’s arm and steering her aside. “Perhaps you need to sit down, Granger?”

“No, no. I'm fine. I'm just terribly... isn't it hot in here? I think it's hot. Stifling. One would think they'd open a window.”

He grinned at her, a really disconcerting look on him tonight. It made him look like a wolf, and Hermione didn’t particularly fancy feeling like a sheep. “Hot flashes, Granger? Or maybe you’d like to share another reason?”

She would sooner dance naked through Diagon Alley. In January. She wasn’t going to jeopardise her work environment for a silly little attraction. She’d already vowed that months ago. She plopped down on a convenient chair. “Oh, just off with you. You have jobs to steal, witches to flirt with, that sort of thing. I'll just sit down for a bit, like you said.”

He narrowed his eyes at her and took a chair near her. “I've been accused of much but never of being a flirt.”

She couldn't help but laugh. “Of course that's the part you take exception to. You should be happy. Through my _decorating_ many witches now _want_ you to flirt with them.” She snapped her mouth shut. That had almost sounded jealous. Perhaps she ought to be careful what she said tonight, so he wouldn’t get the wrong idea. She probably shouldn’t give him makeovers in the future, if this was what happened.

Fortunately he barely seemed to register it. “What's it to me, if they didn't want me to before?” He looked around at the hundreds of people in their finery around them. “One thing I learned from being a Malfoy is that shallow loyalties are dangerous.” He grinned at her. “But then again, seduction has been known to secure deeper loyalties, perhaps I ought to try it.”

Hermione took another deep gulp of her wine.

***

“I don't mean to be a party pooper,” Malfoy began.

“What do you mean? You're always a party pooper,” Hermione dryly interjected. Ah, yes. That felt nice and normal.

“All right. I do mean it, then.” He stared up at the huge sign in front of them and the seemingly endless row of holly-decorated linen sacks with little pictures above them. “But this is madness.”

“Just do it.” Hermione glanced at a picture, wrote a sentence on a card, and dropped it in the sack below.

“I will. Under protest.”

Hermione grimaced. Malfoy's complaining aside, he had a point. Everyone had been told to participate in this _The Spirit of Holly - Celebrating Everlasting Beauty_ event. They had to write something positive about every single other person in the Ministry Departments. That was a lot of positive about a lot of people. And if you didn't know someone, you were supposed to seek them out and exchange a few sentences. At least it was anonymous.

“Let's see... nice eyes, nice teeth, nice... uh, ears...” Malfoy muttered, scratching on one card after another.

A startled laugh escaped Hermione. “You can't just do that!”

“Watch me,” he muttered, and then he shot her a mischievous smile.

The temperature seemed to go up again, and Hermione had to use her cards to fan herself. _Oh, Merlin. I need another drink._

***

A couple of hours, a few too many glasses of wine, and a severe writing cramp later, Hermione and Malfoy were again sitting together. Everyone had managed to finish their cards and the sacks had been distributed among their proper recipients. All around them people were looking at the cards and laughing and chatting about it. There was something to be said about compliments, even if some of them were a bit inane.

Malfoy looked at his sack with no enthusiasm and then lifted his chin in the direction of Hermione's. “You first.”

“Who says I'll share?”

“Oh, you know you will.”

She sighed and pulled out a card. “Oh, look. I'm clever.” She pulled out a handful. “Clever, clever, driven, and clever. I sense a pattern here."

Malfoy pulled up a handful of his own. “Ambitious...” He frowned.

“And?”

“And this is a stupid game.”

Nothing piqued Hermione's curiosity more than a Malfoy who wouldn't share nice things said about him. “What does it say? Tell me!”

“Shallow nonsense.”

She narrowed her eyes, and before he realised what she was about, her hand shot out and grabbed his card.

“Hey, give it--”

She fended him off and her eyebrows shot up when she read the card. “Oh, Malfoy. I’m going to have to have a look at your arse now.”

“Yeah? Well, it’s the one about my hands that will make you blush.” He snatched his card back.

She giggled. Perhaps it was the wine, but she couldn’t help herself. Nor could she help the excited flush brought to her cheeks as she couldn’t help but glance at his long, sleek fingers. “Let me see.”

“Not even if you went down on your knees and begged me.”

“I don’t know,” she purred. “I don’t think you could resist me on my knees.”

He gaped at her. “You did not just say that!”

“Say what?” She blinked, and then her own words slowly dawned on her. “Oh!” She threw her first handful of cards at him. “You have such a filthy mind!”

He only laughed and ducked from the attack. She thought he looked heart-stoppingly adorable when he forgot to frown and acted carefree like this.

_What am I doing?_

Abruptly she stopped playing around and began going over her cards like her life depended on it. Soon it would be permissible for her to go home, and she could forget how stupidly appealing Malfoy could choose to look. Not that she’d ever found him unappealing. Honestly, right now she was cursing herself for wanting to see just how good he could look. The answer was too good by half.

“Oh, here's one that sounds like you could've written it,” Malfoy suddenly said. “ _A diligent and punctual worker._ ”

“Yeah, it does sound like me,” she absentmindedly acknowledged.

He smiled briefly and tossed it in the pile. It hadn’t been hers and they both knew it.

Then Hermione came across a card different from the others.

_Your smile brings light to the darkest of hearts._

Well, wasn't that... just... She stared at the familiar scrawl.

“What is it?” Malfoy asked.

“Nothing.” Hermione quickly slipped it into a hidden pocket in her robes and continued looking over the rest of her cards. “You get anything interesting?” 

“Depends on your definition of interesting.” He scratched his neck, looking a bit embarrassed.

“Well, I seem to be about done,” she said, not really in the mood for more of Malfoy’s ‘interesting’ cards. “Too bad you didn't get any you liked.”

“I didn't say that. I quite like this one.” He showed her a card that said, _The hidden beauty inside you shines the brightest through your eyes_.

Hermione wrinkled her nose, trying to ignore her speeding pulse. “Isn't it a bit corny?”

“Perhaps.” He pocketed the card and shot her a sideways glance. “But I wonder if anyone will ever admit to writing it.”

“I doubt it.” She attempted to take another drink, but suddenly found her hand to be empty. “Hey!”

“You're getting drunk, Granger. Time to go.”

“Who's the boss of whom, here?”

He got up and leaned down over her. Merlin, she didn't need a reminder that he also smelled good tonight. “Monday you can be the boss of me again, but I've had enough bossing around for today. Come on, I'll see you home.”

“Excuse me, but I can get home perfectly well on my own, thank you.”

“Would you let me go off on my own, were I completely sloshed?”

“I'm not sloshed.”

“Would you?”

She sighed. “No.”

“Then come on.”

***

By the time they arrived in front of the cottage, Hermione had decided that the only way to survive the heat of the side-along Apparition with Malfoy, was to overdo it and sing Deck The Halls at full lung capacity. Of course, she couldn't actually remember much of the lyrics, so it was really only a lot of off-key and obnoxiously loud falalalala lalalala.

It blocked out the tension between them beautifully.

Malfoy finally combated the noise by clasping a hand over her mouth. The feel of his warm skin against her lips was doing a very good job of undoing all her hard work. When she glared at him, he simply said, “I'll remove my hand if you promise not to sing.” When she reluctantly nodded, he did as promised while shaking his head. “If only I knew what got into you today, Granger. You're acting frightfully odd.”

She was. Casting about for anything to say, she blurted out, “Do you know the story of Pygmalion?”

“Who?”

“You are Pygmalion!” She nodded, but then frowned. “No, I'm Pygmalion. You're Galatea. Or even Eliza! Then I can be Henry Higgins.” She purposefully pronounced the name dropping the H's.

“You make very little sense, you know that, right?”

She grinned. “I'm counting on it, Eliza. Too bad they had to go and ruin the ending for the musical, though. Well, not exactly ruin it. I suppose it’s closer to the original. But as a woman, I think I much better like the--”

“All right, I think it'll make more sense talking to that tree over there right now. In you go. Your key?”

Hermione began fumbling for her key and forgetting her promise humming a rather bad rendition of _Wouldn't It Be Loverly_. Malfoy didn't comment, but snatched the key from her to unlock her door.

Hermione waded in without bothering with the lights. Malfoy followed, picking up the coat she'd carelessly tossed on the floor and locating the light switch. Hermione began battling a boot while jumping on one foot and almost toppled over, so he sighed and directed her to a chair, before kneeling down to help her. 

Oh, his hair smelled far too nice. What was it with her today? It was as if her hormones had gone into overdrive. True, it had been far too long since she’d been kissed, but still. He was off-limits, even though she couldn’t remember why right now. Right now it didn’t seem like a bad idea at all.

"There, all done." He began to rise, but without thinking she suddenly grabbed onto his forearms. They were still nice and firm. Warm. He stopped, looking down at her quizzically, his head far too close to hers, his forelock tickling her face. She wouldn’t have to lean that far forward. An inch, maybe two, and then she could feel his lips against hers. Before she was even done wondering how that would be, she’d automatically leaned in.

He nimbly dodged her and grinned. "Merlin, Granger. You really are drunk, aren't you? Get some sleep."

He left. And unfortunately she wasn't drunk enough to not feel the waves of embarrassment washing through her.

***

By Monday Hermione was reasonably certain she could pretend like nothing had happened. Nothing _had_ happened, after all. The only slight glitch in her plan was when she saw Malfoy and he hadn't changed his hair back. Damn if that new hair didn't soften his features and make him look too delectable by half. At least he was back to strict black robes, that was at least something. The last thing she needed right now was to be caught checking out that fine arse of his around the office.

There was nothing at all new in his demeanour. He did his work and made sarcastic comments as usual, but didn't comment on anything that had--or hadn't--happened. Oddly, that felt a little disappointing.

"Granger, is there any particular reason why you keep staring at me today?" he later asked as they both sat at their desks, facing each other.

"You kept the hair," she blurted out.

"Didn't really have time to fix it, but I might keep it. I find it's easier to get things done when people actually pay me any mind, and now at least half of the people do." He looked up at her with another one of those mischievous smiles he seemed to have adopted overnight. "Although it does seem to distract my superior."

Heat suffused her cheeks. "No, just... It's just... I think I owe you--"

"Whatever you mean to say, you should probably just forget it." And just like that, his good mood seemed gone.

But perhaps she needed to say this in order to let it go. "No.I… I don’t know what got into me… I had a lot of wine, and…”

He sighed. “And that’s what got into you is what you mean to say, right?”

She nodded. "I suppose. I should never have allowed myself to become so... so... inebriated. It was unforgivable, and I hope it won’t influence our working relationship."

He stared at her and then slowly put down his quill. "Maybe we do need to talk about this."

"I've said everything I needed to, so... just know that it won't happen again. Excuse me, I have to take this to Accounting." She hurried on her way, telling herself that she wasn't fleeing from him but simply moving on with her day.

***

The next day Malfoy was wearing new robes. Obviously he'd been back to see Madam Bouchard. Hermione understood, she really did; it must be nice to get all this positive attention, but it really wasn't fair of him to be so damn _attractive_ when she was struggling with it.

_But then, you always knew he was attractive,_ a small voice inside her said. _That's why you came up with that stupid idea. You wanted to see how good he could look, even if he was off-limits. You wanted to cross the line for one night._

Stupid truth-speaking voice.

***

"Malfoy, I have good news for you!" Hermione greeted him as she entered the office some days later. It had taken her a good ten minutes outside the door to work up the courage and the fake cheer for the greeting.

"Oh?" He stood up from his chair behind his desk. The damn man was wearing burgundy robes today that really shouldn't do anything for him, yet the colour and cut made him look like a very sexy fairy tale prince. Curse that Madam Bouchard.

"I talked to Mr Prattle from Magical Creatures, and they're prepared to offer you a position!" She gauged his reaction, but his face remained impassive. "It's a promotion, you'll get your own office and everything!" She waited again.

"I decline."

That wasn't at all what she'd expected and she gaped at him. "I know it's probably not your favourite area, but with your ambition you'll know that having at least a passing knowledge of several departments is a plus when trying to advance."

"I do know that."

"Well?"

"I still decline."

"Why?!"

"Do you wish to fire me, then?"

"What?"

He clenched his jaw. "Do I still work at this office?"

"Yes, of course."

"All right." He sat back down and resumed his work as if nothing had happened.

Hermione stood watching him for a while before again gently asking, "You won't tell me why?"

He kept writing. "If Mr Prattle wants to hire me, he can approach me himself. In the meantime," he finally looked up and pierced her with an icy glare, "if you have a problem with me working with you now, you can damn well talk to me instead of trying to get rid of me in a way that makes you feel better about yourself."

The tricky part was that if he insisted on working for her, she hadn’t anything to talk to him about.

***

“I am offended at the thought of being thought of as your creation, _Henry Higgins_.” Malfoy dropped a stack of scrolls in front of Hermione, who almost shot out of her chair. She had been buried deep in the Ministry Archives for hours, researching precedence for a legislation and hadn’t even heard Malfoy approach. 

Quickly recovering from her surprise, she leaned towards him as if she was taking him into his confidence. “That’s exactly what Eliza would say.” She saw the slight twitch in Malfoy’s lips before he smothered it. The man was obviously determined to be angry with her. She looked at him for a long moment. “I don’t believe this is the place for this.”

“No, it isn’t,” he agreed, but his gaze never wavered. He was clearly not going to let her off the hook this time. And perhaps he was in the right. Dancing around the issue at hand was both cowardly and, frankly, tiring.

She sighed. It couldn’t be helped. They needed to talk this through. She calmly got to her feet. “All right, take me someplace where we can talk.”

***

Hermione looked around and raised an eyebrow. “So… the woods?”

“I thought you might appreciate the holly shrubs, given your love for all things prickly. And we have privacy here.”

“Good call.” Hermione craned her neck to better appreciate the tall shrubs in the fading light. “On both counts.”

She certainly did seem to appreciate prickly things.

“Thank you. Now please answer me why you would--”

“Why didn’t you kiss me?”

That silenced him.

“Oh, suddenly you don’t want to talk?” she teased.

He scowled at her. “Because I knew you would blame the wine for it.”

She squinted up at the moon. It appeared to be its first quarter. “Then we could’ve fought it out.”

“I didn’t want to fight about it. Is that so unreasonable?”

“I suppose not.” She looked over at him. “But today you came angling for a fight anyway.”

“I’m tired of being confused and frustrated. I thought we might get somewhere at the gala, with those cards, but then you decided to ignore my card and not take responsibility for your own. How was that supposed to make me feel?”

“I didn’t ignore it.”

“You didn’t acknowledge it either.”

She sighed. “What was I supposed to say? As long as you work under me, nothing can happen.”

“Hold on.” He grabbed her arm. “Is that it? You’ve evaded me because you’re my _boss_? Not because of our past or my personality or anything like that, but because of _work_?”

“There are rules, you know.”

He gaped at her as if she were the most unreasonable witch since the time of creation. “Why didn’t you just say so?!”

She pursed her lips. “And how was I supposed to say it? ‘Please transfer out so I can snog the living daylights out of you’?”

“That could’ve been a start, yeah.”

“All right.” She took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eyes. “Please transfer out so I can snog the living daylights out of you!”

“Done. I’ll be in another department by January. I’ll bother them all through the holidays if I have to.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“That was easy.”

“Unlike you, I’m always easy.”

“No, you’re not. You’re horribly difficult.”

His lip quirked up in a crooked grin. “But my shining inner beauty makes up for it, does it?”

She cringed. “Only because my smile lights it up.”

He laughed at that. “Everything else aside, we were dreadfully corny, weren’t we?”

“Horribly.”

He took a step closer. “We should probably stop talking now.”

“Hold on. It’s not January, I can’t snog the living daylights out of you yet.” Yet she was already leaning into him.

“Then I suppose I will have to snog the living daylights out of you.”

And so he did.

**Author's Note:**

> Literary references:
> 
> _Pygmalion - mythology_  
>  The story of a man, who falls in love with a sculpture he's made of his ideal woman, and Aphrodite then brings her to life for him. The name Galatea has been attributed to this sculpture woman later.
> 
> _Pygmalion - play by George Bernard Shaw_  
>  An interpretation of the Greek myth with a strongly feminist twist. The "creation", a flower girl turned into a lady, does not conform to expectations and marry her "maker" but rather goes off in pursuit of her own happiness with the new tools given her.
> 
> _My Fair Lady - musical based on the play by George Bernard Shaw_  
>  GBS fought very hard to make his contemporaries keep the independence of Eliza in his story when they put up the play. Popular demand was always for Eliza and Henry Higgins to end up together. I don't think he'd have liked this musical very much, but I suppose that in a sense it's closer to the original myth.
> 
> It's really not that important, though. Hermione was simply rambling, but there you have it. I knew someone would ask me. ;)
> 
> Merry Christmas. Hope you enjoyed this little story. :)


End file.
